The Windows PC and Xbox 360 editions of Mass Effect 3 are available illegally online in advance of this week's official release of the action/RPG sequel. This is deemed mainstream news by Develop (though they aren't actually providing torrent links), who note that this seems to work in spite of EA requiring use of the Origin service for a one-time game activation.

eunichron wrote on Mar 5, 2012, 15:34:Not that I'm trying to defend asshole companies like UbiSoft that try to blame PC piracy for all of their woes, but I can look at my BitGamer account right now and tell you that the number of seeders and leechers for the PC version easily outnumbers the number of seeders and leechers for the 360 and PS3 versions combined by at least twofold. In fact, here's a screenshot for you: http://i.imgur.com/qyI2a.jpg

Most people don't mod their own consoles, they get one of many local modding shops to do them. Once modded the process of piracy is about equal in terms of ease. A gaming PC has other upkeep to consider as well that many users don't want to deal with, hence people buying consoles. Console games typically aren't as well seeded (for many reasons) and their piracy is more prevalent on Usenet and private sites, which makes it difficult to really get an idea of how they stack up.

One thing we know for sure, Microsoft bans around half a million pirates every November in their infamous banwaves out of a userbase of 34ish million. Those are simply the ones who get caught to boot.

Piracy is a silly scapegoat for many problems, the real issue has already been mentioned - consoles are simply a larger market period. It's always been that way and likely will always be that way. It doesn't mean anything by itself and certainly doesn't make the PC platform less viable.